Strictly Come Dancing: Ainsley Harriott Continues Male Exits, But Past Winners Are 50/50

Ainsley Harriott was the fourth male celeb in a row to be voted off ‘Strictly Come Dancing’ after losing out to Jamelia in the dance off this weekend. But if you look at the show overall, men have been just as successful as women.

Ainsley is the FOURTH male celeb to leave the competition. Copyright [BBC]

The chef’s exit from the dancing competition follows on from Daniel O’Donnell last week, Anthony Ogogo the week before, and first out Iwan Thomas.

When asked about the gender quirk, Ainsley said: “Over the years, we have seen that the male dancers with women have come out on top because the men are the ones that lead.

“Maybe that’s a slight sort of advantage instead of being an amateur like me and trying to lead a brilliant dancer like Natalie.”

All four judges voted to save Jamelia over Ainsley. Copyright [BBC]

Although male contestants have been losing out so far in this thirteenth season of ‘Strictly’, that’s not reflected in the gender balance of past winners.

When you look back at the show’s history, there is EXACTLY the same number of male winners as female winners over the 12 seasons.

Natasha Kaplinsky kicked things off in series one, followed by Jill Halfpenny. Then there were two male sports stars, Darren Gough and Mark Ramprakash, followed by Alesha Dixon, then two more male winners back-to-back; Tom Chambers and Chris Hollins.

Kara Tointon stepped in to stop the male run of winning, only to be followed by Harry Judd and Louis Smith. But then the last two years were ruled by women; Abbey Clancy followed by reigning champ Caroline Flack.

So if a female celeb wins this year, it’ll be the first time ever that three contestants of the same sex have won in consecutive years.

So far, so bad for the male celebs. Copyright [BBC]

However, there’s no obvious gender of the winner for season 13 of ‘SCD’, with men and women topping the judges’ leaderboard over the weeks.

Peter Andre and Jay McGuiness have both scored top with the judges in past weeks, as have Katie Derham, Kellie Bright and Helen George.

Surely the gender thing is just a coincidence this year? And if a man (*coughs* Jay *coughs*) goes on to win, this initial run of bad luck for the guys will be forgotten.